Fall Favorites – Pumpkin Apple Cake

Posted on October 14, 2013 by Jackie

Fall is upon on us and that means baking season is here! Pumpkin, apple, pies, cakes, soups, casseroles, and all sorts of amazing dishes will be enjoyed at every day meals and special occasions.

And to celebrate the season I am going to be featuring a different recipe and a different blogger each Wednesday and Friday until we reach the holiday season. By that time you’ll have an arsenal of recipes for all of your holiday parties!

Because of my love of pumpkin and apple I have a cake that has both of them in it. It’s the best of both worlds! This pumpkin apple cake is sweet, dense, and delicious. It has rich pumpkin flavor with little bits of apple scattered throughout the cake. It’s the perfect end to a chilly fall day with a warm cup of chai… tea… coffee… or even warm spiced cider.

When I made the cake over the weekend I was going to leave it plain or just give it a dusting of powdered sugar and then my daughter stepped in. Cream cheese frosting was required to make it perfect. And just so you know, it was perfect. It added a little bit of extra… oohmp… to the cake.

Fall Favorites – Pumpkin Apple Cake

Ingredients

3 eggs
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup apple sauce
1 can (15 ounces) pumpkin not pumpkin pie filling
1/3 cup apple cider or juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 cups peeled apples (finely chopped, about 2 medium)

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350°F.
Spray a 13x9 or bundt pan with vegetable pan spray.
In large bowl, beat eggs with electric mixer until they turn a light yellow color. Gradually add sugars, oil, apple sauce, pumpkin, cider, and vanilla; beat thoroughly.
Sift flour, cinnamon, salt and baking soda together; add to egg mixture and mix well. Stir in apples.
Pour into pan.
Bake 55-60 minutes for a bundt pan and 35 - 40 for a 13x9 pan, or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Let cool in pan 15 minutes. Remove from pan and cool completely on wire rack if you're using a bundt pan.
When cool frost with your favorite cream cheese frosting or glaze.

https://withjustabitofmagic.com/pumpkin-apple-cake

If you wanted you could even use a couple of 9in cake pans and make this into a layer cake. But in the essence of time and ease I used a 13×9…. meaning I wanted to be able to eat it sooner rather than later.

Are you interested in guest posting and sharing your favorite fall recipe here? If so, I’d love to have you here with me so just email me or leave me a comment.

Make sure to come back and check out all of the incredible guests that will be sharing their favorite fall recipes with you!

Top 6 iPhone Apps!

Posted on September 5, 2013 by Jackie

We live in a world where the majority of people have smart phones and the iPhone is one of the top choices of the people. As a matter of fact I am an Apple Fan Girl and absolutely love my iPhone & iPad. You’d be hard pressed to get me to trade it for something else.

But it isn’t just the fact that the device is awesome, it’s the apps that really make it fun. I love finding new apps and what I love even more is when they’re free (I’m cheap…) and on occasion you can find the paid for apps free for a short time too.

So what are my favorites? What are the top 6 iPhone apps that I think everyone should have? Keep reading!

I should let you know that these are in no particular order. I love them all equally and narrowing it down to just 6 apps that I adore is hard! I spent a lot of time looking at my phone and iPad trying to decide which ones made the list.

Drumroll please….

Find my phone – I don’t know how many times my son has taken my phone and set it down somewhere and I can’t find it. I call it but it’s on silent, I ask him and he doesn’t know, and I’m left to search the entire house until I find it. This handy app eliminates all the searching. All you have to do is sign in on another iOS device with your Apple id and you can locate your phone, remotely lock your device, erase personal data, and more.

Instagram – I think that just about everyone knows what this app is. I love it though! I can share images from my life… my kids, my work, my travels, and of course my food. With filters and frames I can make my pictures look awesome. What I really like though is that it gives us a glimpse into our friends lives and the world around them.

Snapseed – This app is awesome for editing photos that you’ve taken with your iPhone. It took me a while to really figure out and how best to use it but once I did… wow! I had a couple amazing pictures and there was even one that a friend thought a professional photographer took.

Feedly – With Google Reader gone I’ve had to find another to keep up with all of my favorite blogs and Feedly is awesome for it!

Netflix – I have this app on every single device whether it’s iOS or not! I love to be able to watch some of my favorite shows even when everyone else is watching something else. It’s also handy to keep littles ones occupied when you’re out shopping or in the waiting room at the doctor’s office.

8tracks radio – I love this new way to listen to music and best of all it’s ad free (when listening there are some on the screen)! You select the type of music, mood, feeling, or whatever and then it’ll give you mixes based on those. You can also create your own mixes. I haven’t created one yet because there are so many others that I like that I don’t have the need yet!

There you have it! 6 awesome iPhone apps that you must check out for your iOS device. Oh… and probably your Android too.

What are some of your favorite apps?

It’s Thursday and for something a little different and fun I’m linking up with Mama Kat for her Writer’s Workshop.

iLove my iPhone – The Smart Phone Update

Posted on May 10, 2011 by Jackie

Image representing Apple as depicted in CrunchBase

Image via CrunchBase

A while back I shared my lament with you about why I needed a real smart phone. You were all very supportive and it was great to see that everyone agreed with me needing one.

Well, best of all the husband heard and this time he really listened. And I am the extremely proud owner of a shiny, new iPhone.

Yes, my Windows husband has moved over to the dark side (where there are tasty cookies) and is slowly becoming an Apple FanBoy. This is truly a remarkable thing if you’ve ever heard him talk about Apple… Windows… etc.

Alright so lets go back a month or so. My husband came home from work and asks me why I didn’t answer my cell phone because he’d been calling. I replied to him that my phone had not rang once and I even had the volume turned up (I’m notorious for leaving it on silent/vibrate). So he grabs the phone and is looking at it, pushing buttons and all that “pretending” to see what’s wrong with it this time. Now here is where I forgot the words that anyone spoke because my daughter (his sidekick in this charade) held up the holy grail… the iPhone box.

My phone didn’t work because he had transferred the number to my brand new iPhone. It was like Christmas but 100 times better. I wanted to stop making dinner, let everyone fend for themselves, and run off to play with is. I restrained myself though and we ate dinner, and then later I played.

Ahh… happiness. Or so you would think. But alas this is not where the story ends.

I being the lucky person that I am was the proud owner of a Lemon. Not an Apple. A Lemon.

My iPhone sucked! Big time. I was sad to admit that my old Windows phone was better. I know you’re all gasping now and I’m sorry if I’ve caused you to spit out your coffee at the screen. But it was really a crappy phone.

Let me list a few if it’s issues.

Apps crashed all the time… like every time I tried to use one.
Battery life was barely a day
The phone constantly rebooted itself
It would randomly get stuck on the Apple logo screen and stay there till you did a hard reboot
When I was on a call it would reboot and within 2 seconds I’d be on the call again… yea, it never lost the call. Just cut out while it went to the Apple logo screen.

I could go on and on about all the trouble that I had but I won’t bore you with all that. Instead I will share with you the awesomeness of the Apple store. I made my appointment, went in, told them what the issue was, and they gave me a new phone. No hassle, no discussion, nothing… they just said we’ll give you a new one if that’s okay.

They took the Lemon and replaced it with an Apple. They moved all my apps and set it up for me before I even left the store.

Ahh… life is good and I love my iPhone. It’s beyond awesome and I have no idea how anyone could live without one.

And what makes it so awesome you ask…